fabrics have landed...

i have had a fun printing and photography sesh and am delighted to show you my results here...

 and the good news is they are in the Etsy shop now!

lots of luscious serene summery sorbet colours, perfect for summer crafting.

umbrella quilt...

 i ticked off a WIP from the list today...

after waiting for my stripes to dry (i had to print up my own binding fabric as i didn't have just the right thing in my stash) i set to sew yesterday and finished it off today.

i am so in love with this umbrella prints range and can't take my eyes off it.

a while ago i got sent some pieces from the elephants love water collection and instantly fell in love. it's no secret that umbrella prints are one of my favourite pair of clever designers and this range is a real winner. 

the red/blue combo is always a success and coupled with amy and carly's eye catching designs on beautiful organic cotton, elephants love water really is a must have range.

i wanted to do something relatively simple and let the bold designs do the talking. i paired the fabrics with some coordinating solids and backed it in a red solid for simplicity.

 more simplicity with some straight line quilting through the wonky windmills and we were done.

i really encourage you to try elephants love water if you haven't already. you won't be disappointed. check out a stockist near you here.

i've listed this baby quilt in my etsy store here. 

countdown...

I am 10 days away from having a stand at my biggest fair to date...and I am bricking it!

I have absolutely no idea what to expect.

In just 10 days Blueberry Park will be at Country Living Christmas Fair, which is in Harrogate for the first time. 

This is the first time too that I will have done a retail event that consists of more than just a table top display.

I have a stand that is 3m x1m, no great shakes in CL terms but since I normally have a single 1.5m at most table, this is one hellava space to fill.

In an attempt to make it as eye-catching as possible, both in decor and items to sell and have some more larger "in your face" pieces I have designed my Pompom Cushion range of Gerry and Steve, to hopefully catch people's attention as they sidle by.

I am also aware that people will be after little stocking fillers and little extras while they are at it, so have also come up with another new item - a trio of xmas tree decos, screen printed on warm fluffy felt.

I am still none-the-wiser how I am going to display everything and still have a vast amount of stock still to make, but hopefully I am there in terms of which items I am going to take.

And to be quite honest with just over a week to go, let's hope so!

If you live in the vicinity and fancy a little excursion, the fair runs from Thursday November 29 until Sunday December 1. I am on stand C60 and would love to see you there!

ps don't forget about the fab Green Bee Pattern giveaway from The Village Haberdashery that I am running until next Weds...enter before it's too late!

I've only just recovered from catching up from the summer holidays. 

Actually I will rephrase that...

I am still recovering from catching up from the summer holidays.

And now it's Half Term...for 2 weeks...what's that all about?!

Apparently it's about seeing quite how far I can stretch before I snap. 

Let's hope it's sometime after all the preparation and execution of the looming Christmas fairs!

Speaking of looming fairs, I will be at the following and would really love to see you...

Selvedge Winter Fair - Sat Nov 10

We Make London Spitalfields Market - Sun Nov 11

Country Living Fair Harrogate - Thurs 29 Nov - Sun 2 Dec

bribery time...

I would really appreciate your opinion...

I'll make it worth your while...

well you read the heading...Bribery Time.

As you know I have been working on my screen printing range for this Autumn/Winter and have developed the 2 colour-ways - Utility above and Frozen Berries below and within that Triangle Mania and Scruffy Daisy.

I have 3 big fairs coming up and so need a lot of stock and obviously I want the right stock for my customers as all the fairs will be a "see it and buy it now" kinda affair, rather than the ordering kinda scenario.

So the question is, what would you choose? If you could pick any 3 items that you are drawn to, either for yourself or thinking ahead as Christmas gifts what digs it for you? Is there a particular pattern? A certain colour? A favourite pouch? I really would greatly appreciate your thoughts on this, my little in house market research buddies.

 So what's in it for you, I hear you ask? Obviously I know you aren't that kind of person and you are happy to just help out I hear you cry, but everyone is entitled to a little reward and I insist.

So, two things. 

The first is if you leave me a comment with your thoughts I'll email you a code for 10% off your next order (so be sure to link to an email address).

Secondly I'll enter you into a draw to win a little selection of your suggestions. Ah, sneaky huh? Now you have to think about what you like, not just be random, because one of you is going to be lumbered with the said pieces.

Seriously though, I really appreciate the time you take in helping me with this.

Thank you! x

Giveaway open until Sunday evening (oh and talking of which, there's still time to enter my fab giveaway from M is for Make...go check it out if you haven't already entered.)

 I have been having a little fun playing around with a few things this week all in the name of "product design and development". That makes it sound much more important than "having a play and see what happens".

A few weeks ago I started experimenting with 2 colour prints, the results of which were the orange and grey below.

I loved the effect but knew that the 2 colours I had picked were too bold together. I hadn't really planned to use these 2 colours together...it was a result of the newsprint testing pieces for the colours I happened to be using at the time and I was merely overlaying on a whim.

It did make me discover however that there was potential for a 2 colour print with my designs, particular with the stripe and scruffy daisy.

Again inspiration triggered by my old newsprint tester sheets, I set to print in pale blue and turquoise and here are the results below...

...and I'm really rather pleased with it!

Is it wrong to be excited by ones own work? It has such a fresh summery (ha!...there's that strange word again) feel to it and think it would work on so many things. I'm planning on making some pretty summery wash-bags to start with and also incorporate into a quilt I'm doing. I printed up a few to start with, so if you want to grab a piece go here.

I'm planning to try it in a light pink/dark pink combo so watch out for that.

My other "product design and development" this week involved printing onto some Quilter's Linen swatches I had received with the view to creating my winter (that's more familiar...) range. It's hard to get a feel for how a fabric is going to look when it is printed on so doing it this way is great.

Quilter's linen is really lovely. It is 100% cotton but has a look of linen due to it's texture markings. I find linen to sometimes be a little stretchy so this is a perfect alternative as it looks great and sews up beautifully.

I now have rather big decisions to be made as actually I like how so many of them have turned out. So a little help please...which colours would you like to see in the collection??